The present invention relates to an inflatable antenna.
The antenna of the present invention is especially useful with a marine buoy employed in satellite communications. The antenna for such a buoy should exhibit hemispherical coverage, including good coverage at low angles with the horizontal. Monopole antennas are not suitable, because they have a null overhead. Spiral antennas have insufficient gain at the horizon.
An antenna suitable for airborne satellite communications is known, and is described in U.S. Pat. No. 3,811,127 issued May 14, 1974 to L. V. Griffee and M. V. Anderson. The antenna disclosed in that patent has four metal blades orthogonally positioned on a support base, which includes a ground plane. Each blade has at the upper edge thereof a metal capacative loading portion which is formed roughly into the shape of a section of a sphere. The blades and associated capacative of loading portions form four radiating elements which are fed in phase quadrature.